


What Is Needful

by edenbound



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Asexual Aziraphale, Asexual Crowley, Asexual Relationship, Genderfluid Crowley (Good Omens), Non-Sexual Intimacy, Other, non-binary Aziraphale, non-binary Crowley
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-13
Updated: 2019-12-13
Packaged: 2021-02-25 21:48:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 768
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21782449
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/edenbound/pseuds/edenbound
Summary: Somebody has to be brave, and Aziraphale supposes it's going to have to be him.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 13
Kudos: 150





	What Is Needful

**Author's Note:**

> This is deliberately Soft fic featuring asexual Crowley/Aziraphale and NB/genderfluid Crowley, specifically because the election in the UK has been a rough time (and a horrid result) for many folks, and queer folks feel especially vulnerable and at risk, and this is one little piece of how I'm trying to cope and help others to cope. There is no politics in the fic, and no angst about either gender identity or sexuality.

"Crowley," Aziraphale says, into the middle of a post-Armageddidn't diatribe that involves a lot of Crowley shouting, waving his arms, and the collapse of one bookshelf after an injudicious and dramatic gesture (which, to his credit, he miracled back to normal without pausing). "Please, could you -- _Crowley!_ "

Something in his tone gets through and Crowley does finally actually look at him, albeit through the dark glasses. There's only a glimpse of his lovely eyes visible. "What?"

It's a bit of a step to take, Aziraphale supposes, still hesitating. But one of them needs to be brave. "Come here," he says, steeling himself against the tremor that tries to take over his voice. Raising an eyebrow, Crowley saunters over, and Aziraphale stands up to meet him. "May I?" he asks. He reaches for Crowley's glasses and when the demon nods -- eyebrow still raised, jaw still tight and tense -- he curls his fingers around them and very carefully unhooks them from Crowley's ears, drawing them off. This feels like an irrevocable step already. His fingertips brush Crowley's cheekbones, and... Crowley seems to be holding his breath and, yes, that's a barely-perceptible shiver running through him.

"Angel," he says, a little unsteadily, and Aziraphale unthinkingly presses his fingers to Crowley's lips.

"Let me... I know we've avoided this for a long time, dearest," he says -- and oh, the endearment falls out of his mouth so easily, so _naturally_. "But I really think it's time for us to admit how we feel about each other. I think that might give us both, well... some measure of peace. I think we've both been looking for purpose, since everything _didn't_ end, since we came together on our own side. And I think... Should I go on?"

Crowley nods. He swallows, and Aziraphale's eyes track the motion of his throat for a moment before flicking back up to his face. His fingers are still on Crowley's lips and, greatly daring, he leaves them there.

"I think that what we can find some of that in each other. I think that what we have is something that can't be defined too easily in human terms. I know that you like to, well, 'switch things up'. And I prefer not to have genitalia at all. And I don't think either of us are interested in sex, per se. But I think all those are human complications that cannot be allowed to obscure the fact that I love you, and want to be with you; you and only you." His heart is hammering. "And I think you feel the same."

Crowley... Crowley kisses his fingertips. "Yes," he says, quietly. "For a long time, now."

"You could have said something!"

A wry smile, and then Crowley has hold of his wrist, gently making him turn his hand. Presses a kiss to the center of his palm that shudders through him, a jolt of tenderness and love, love, _love_. "I thought I had. 'We could go off together...'"

"Before that," Aziraphale says, trying and failing to maintain his huffiness. Crowley kisses his wrist, where his pulse beats, his breath a warm tickle against the fragile skin there. "Crowley -- "

"You're right," he says, "about the sex thing and the gender thing and all the rest of it. It's you and me, angel. As long as I'm by your side, it'll be fine. I don't want or need anything else. We can figure it all out as we go along." He pulls away a little. Raises an eyebrow again. "What did this have to do with what I was saying?"

"Well," Aziraphale says, not quite meeting Crowley's eyes, feeling ridiculous even to himself, "I thought it might help if I offered you a hug. And then all the rest of it just..." He gestures, vaguely.

"I'll take the hug," Crowley says, without moving, and it's Aziraphale who closes the gap between them (the gap that has been closing ever so slowly but surely since the day Crowley sheltered under his wing in the rain; the gap that has only ever been of his own making, that he has maintained for himself against the rightness of this, this connection between them, this comfort) and wraps his arms around Crowley. It's Aziraphale who pulls Crowley forward, bumps their foreheads together, and Aziraphale who feels Crowley relaxing into his arms, six _thousand_ years of tension and fear sloughed off like an old skin just because of _this_.

"You've needed this, my dear," he says, barely louder than a breath.

"Shut up," Crowley says, no louder, and without pulling away by so much as a nanometre.


End file.
